


All that was me is Gone

by suyari



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-01
Updated: 2016-04-01
Packaged: 2018-05-30 12:17:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6423610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suyari/pseuds/suyari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He calls them ‘Becket Boys’ for a reason. And every day before that one, the Becket Boys - fresh from drift, or dried out a week - were always one brilliant, vivacious creature.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All that was me is Gone

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr (two years ago) in response to [this](http://skeevy-skeeve.tumblr.com/post/81977176716/it-broke-my-heart-that-i-couldnt-even-tell-him) absolutely amazing piece of artwork.

Nobody quite understands the way Tendo does. They mourn Yancy. They look in on Raleigh. But they’ve always only ever seen one or the other. Even when the brothers were together, in full gear, fresh from the drift, they were always Yancy and Raleigh.

But Tendo, Tendo knows. Tendo’s seen. He calls them ‘Becket Boys’ for a reason. And every day before that one, the Becket Boys - fresh from drift, or dried out a week - were always one brilliant, vivacious creature. Charming and funny and the right balance of sweet with a sadistic streak just right for pulling the kind of pranks people talked about for decades.

The Becket Boys were the full compliment of one another. Engaging and brilliant, like watching the sun traverse the sky, casting everything in an array of colors that stole away your ability to breathe. They talked as one, moved as one, and even at their worst, they balanced one another so completely, so perfectly that often people forgot there was nearly three years difference between them. They blended so seamlessly people had difficulty telling them apart, their forms blending together like identical twins. Yet, somehow, people still considered them to be two people.

Tendo knows the reason Raleigh won’t speak. Knows why he lies in bed day in and day out and refuses to move, to eat, to have his wounds tended, or participate in therapy. It’s so obvious, he can’t help but find himself _furious_ with his caretakers. He wants to yell and scream and kick something; instead, he visits Raleigh in between his duties, takes time to talk to him during his breaks, and every day, he sits at his bedside and reads.

They don’t understand, but Tendo does. There is absolutely _nothing_ about Raleigh they can hope to fix, because all of Raleigh’s injuries were swept away by the tide. You can’t restart a shattered heart. You can’t force lungs to fill when there is no air. You can’t expect a man to get up and walk when his limbs have been torn from him. And you can’t demand a body to heal and a mind to move on when the soul has been ripped clear free.

When Raleigh talks at all, it’s to utter Yancy’s name in broken starts and awkward stops. Vowels soundless and consonants resonating. Like a mantra, said over and over, and never once with the slightest change beyond completely and utterly disemboweled. Growing progressively less steady, until the only sound is the harsh raking of air as it strangles him slowly from within.

They sedate him, only to start again. Heedless of the damage they do. Careless with the progress they do not make.

And always, Tendo returns. Sleeps at night in a chair that leaves his back in knots, muscles bunched and aching in hard to reach places. And every morning, he smooths back Raleigh’s hair, kisses his forehead and says, “Hey there, Becket Boy.”

It becomes so ingrained within his routine, the morning Raleigh sits up as he turns to leave startles Tendo into speechlessness.

“Say it again.”

“Becket Boy.”

Raleigh’s face contorts, color rushing to it as his eyes fill quickly with tears.

“Becket Boy,” Tendo says again.

The blond rakes in a ragged breath, shoulders trembling.

“Becket Boy.”

Raleigh collapses forward with a sound Tendo hasn’t heard since San Fransisco. He’s better prepared this time, however, and he catches Raleigh in arms that have never been as strong as his hands are fast.

Hands clutch at his shirt as an agonized scream fights it’s way up from the depths of the jagged, open wound in Raleigh’s new found solitary existence. The part of him that is still attached to Yancy, that will always be Yancy, even if it’s gone all dark and cold and empty. Tendo jerks him close as the scream finds purchase, ripping through the young pilot, forcing his entire body into a taut bow of rage and loss.

The door bursts open as Raleigh explodes into sobs and Tendo glares until every last one of them leaves. Steps into his space, draws Raleigh close and holds him as tightly as his limbs will allow to keep him from flying apart. Every last part of him dissolving away under the sudden return to a world where Yancy can no longer be found. A world, Tendo knows, that is the _last_ place Raleigh wants to be.

His hands clutch, fingers cramping, but Raleigh’s shaking so hard, his sobs so loud and wrenching Tendo can hear them as clearly as if he weren’t burying them in his shirt. He holds Raleigh, who clings to him - the only lifeline in a turbulent storm - and whispers the first prayer he’s ever uttered into the void, and a spirit not his own God. But he thinks, if anyone will answer, Yancy will. What’s a little blasphemy in the wake of an inconsolably bereft soulmate?


End file.
